Grain-car door-sill



D P VAN LIEW I Grain-Gar "Door-Sill.

Patented Mair. 9,1880.

UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE,

, I l DENNIS F. VAN LIEW, OF AURORA, ILLINOIS.

GRAIN-CAR DOOR-SILL.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 225,441, dated March 9,1880.

Application filed January 8, 1880.

To all whom it may concern Be it known that I, DENNIs F. VAN LIEw, ofAurora, in the county of Kane and State of Illinois, have invented anImprovement in Car Grain-Door Sills or Thresholds, of which thefollowing is a specification.

The nature of my invention relates to 'anew and useful improvement inthe construction of a sill or threshold for the doorways of cars adaptedfor carrying grain and provided with swinging or sliding doors soarranged that when said doors are closed their free ends engage insockets in the door-frame, to hold them firmly and tightly in place; andthe invention consists in the peculiar construction, in combination withsuch doors and the car, of a threshold or sill which will act as a guideto compel the door, as it is being closed, to enter the socket, andpresent a resistance to the bottom of the door against the, outwardpressure of the grain in the car, substantially as hereinafterdescribed.

Figure 1 is an elevation of the inside of a section of a grain-car,showing the door-open ing and grain-door; and Fig. 2 is a verticalcross-section of the same on the line 00 w in Fig. 1.

In the accompanying drawings, which form a part of this specification, Arepresents the side of a car, provided with doorway B and a door, 0, bymeans of which the opening is closed or unclosed at will, said door andconnections being operated by one of the various methods now in use. Inthe drawings the door is shown in position as being partially closed.When the closing is entirely complete the bottom of the door rests uponthe threshold, and the end a of the door is designed to enter the socketb on the doorpost, by which means it is designed to effectually closethe lower half of the door-opening against the escape of grain.

As the thresholds are ordinarily constructed there is nothing to guidethe door to its socket, and if grain or other obstruction has fallenupon the threshold it elevates the door by so much as the thickness ofsuch obstruction, thereby allowing the grain in the car to sift outunder the door. To obviate these difficulties I construct, preferably byrolling wrought-iron, a threshold or sill, of

the width of the timbers of the door-frame, substantially of the formshown in Fig. 2, wherein D represents such threshold provided with achannel, a, the inner wall, at, of which is simply high enough to act asa guide to keep the door in the channel, and the opposite wall, 0, beingconsiderably higher, as shown, to guide the door to its socket. At thesame time, if ice should form in the channel, or grain fall therein, soas to fill such channel to the height of wall cl, it will not affect thefunction to be performed by the outer wall, 0, which will still guidethe door to its d, serves to break the abrupt rise caused by beingreadily rolled out of the car; but by the use of a channel having aninner wall above the floor of the car this objection is overcome, assaid wall acts as an incline to break the abruptness of the rise fromthe level of the floor to the top of the sill, whereby barreled freightmay be readily rolled over the sill. Such inner wall alsoserves tostrengthen the sill, and prevents, to some extent, the wear of the outerwall, and also the great shocks caused to barrels by coming in contactwith the abrupt edge of the outer wall when there is no inner wall toease and divide the shock.

As this threshold or sill is adapted to be used with nearly all thestyles of grain-doors in use, I do not desire to confine its use to thedoor shown in the drawings, which is simply designed to illustrate theadaptation of the sill.

This sill is provided with suitable holes, through which bolts or screwsh pass to secure it to the bottom of the door-frame and floor.

What I claim as my invention is- 1. As a new article of manufacture, acast, forged, or rolled iron threshold having a channel, 0, whose Wallsd e are of different heights, substantially as herein shown, and for thepurpose specified.

2. In combination with a railway-car provided with a sliding or swinginggrain-door, substantially as herein described, the threshold D, providedwith the channel a, and the walls thereof, d e, of difierent heights,substantially as and for the purpose set forth.

3. In combination with a railway-car provided with the socket b, and adoor having one end rabbeted to fit in said socket, a threshold having anarrow channel adapted to receive the lower corner of said rabbeted end,and whose inner wall receives the weight of 15 the door when closed.

DENNIS F. VAN LIEW. Witnesses:

H. S. SPRAGUE,

CHARLES J. HUNT.

